Strawberry Pie

July 1st is Andy's birthday and seeing how I'm close to broke, I figured making him his favorite pie would be a good birthday present. He LOVES strawberries and loves strawberry pie so of course I went to Pinterest and looked for Strawberry Pie recipes. I found a really simple one that turned out amazing. Because I didn't want to screw up Andy's birthday present I went with frozen pie crust but I made the strawberry filling from scratch. Of course I did almost screw up the pie crust but Andy saved the day. I put the pie crust in the oven to bake and instantly forgot about it. When I tell myself I don't need to set a timer because I'll remember to check...I should really set a timer. I went about starting to chop the strawberries and after a bit of time and I hear a "It smells like pie crust" comment from the living room. An expletive left my mouth faster than a bullet from a gun and I threw the knife down on the counter, grabbed the potholder, and took the crust out of the oven. Thankfully it wasn't burned but it ended up being a little overdone. Friends, this is exactly why I went with a frozen pie crust. It came in a package of two so if I burned the first one (which I almost did) I'd have a back-up.

Anywhos. Back to the pie recipe. It consists of 5 ingredients with one of the ingredients being strawberries. It really can't be any more simple.

Ingredients:
One frozen pie crust (or you can make it homemade...obviously. I don't think I needed to tell you that).
Two pounds of strawberries
3 tbsp Cornstarch
1 cup of Sugar (or less depending on how ripe the strawberries are)
Lemon juice - half of a lemon

I baked the pie crust first. I baked the crust according to package directions, forgot about it and over-baked it a little bit, but it seemed to turn out okay.

While the crust was baking I started with the strawberries. First, you'll want to cut off the green tops to the strawberries. This is what my hulled strawberries looked like. Delicious.

Second, chop one pound of strawberries into tiny pieces. A food processor or a blender would make this part of the pie process easier but I did it with a steak knife. It worked just fine. See? It was during the chopping phase that I was reminded of the pie crust. Sheesh.

After I chopped one pound of strawberries, I put them in a sauce pan with one cup of sugar and three tablespoons of corn starch. A saute pan would work fine too.

I really didn't want to screw up the strawberry filling so I waited until I hulled and halved the second pound of strawberries to heat the strawberries. There were some massive strawberries in the second package so I had to cut some strawberries three times. It still worked.

After I finished cutting the strawberries, I boiled the strawberry/sugar/cornstarch on medium heat for 5-10 minutes. It looked and smelled delicious. I wish there was a way to bottle up the smell and add smell-o-vision to the blog because it was heavenly.

After about 10 minutes on medium heat, and after the strawberry juices start to flow, I put the heat to low and used a whisk to crush the strawberries a little bit and it'll start to make a thicker, gooey, yummy looking sauce. This is where I added in the lemon juice. I did not have a lemon but I did have lemon juice so I had to use that. I added enough juice as I thought half a lemon might have. Not sure if it made a difference or not. Maybe next time I'll leave out the lemon juice and see if there's a difference.

After adding in the lemon juice take the pan off the heat. The sauce should be a little thicker and should stick to the whisk before falling off. I'm not sure I had the sauce thick enough just because the pie didn't set as nice as I hoped it would. It stayed on the whisk for about 10-15 seconds before falling off. This seemed thick enough but I'd make sure it sticks to the whisk a little longer (30-60 seconds) before falling off.

Once the pan has been removed from the heat, add the halved strawberries to the sauce and mix it together. The strawberries in the yummy sauce looked amazing and it tasted amazing.

Because I baked the pie crust first it was all ready for my filling when my filling was done. I waited for it to cool a little bit and I added it to my crust and it looked like a strawberry pie! Believe me, every time I bake or cook something there's always the possibility it will not turn out.

The recipe said that the pie should set in the fridge for 2 hours and I took Andy to a birthday lunch so my pie actually set for about 4 hours. Unfortunately the sauce wasn't thick enough so it didn't set as well as I had hoped but the pie tasted soooo good. I don't like pie crust...at all. I could've eaten the filling right out of the pie crust. I whole-heartedly believe that pie crust is unnecessary for pie.

Look what the birthday boy got just for being the birthday boy!  Jealous?

All in all this is a really good pie recipe. The blog I found the recipe on said the sauce is great as a waffle, pancake, or ice cream topping and I truly believe it. I think this is a recipe that I'll make again. It's not fire-box proof worthy but pretty dang close. Until next time...

Fire Away!